Coach Pete DeBoer doesn’t award anything to his team’s best player after a victory. No fedora (Rangers), hard hat (Capitals), shovel (Penguins) or boxing belt (Blackhawks), which have been rituals for other clubs in recent years.

The reward for a victory over the Rangers onTuesday night at the Prudential Center, DeBoer suggested, just might be a spot in the playoffs when the regular season is completed.

“You look at our schedule the rest of the way, and how we do against our division is going play a big part in where we finish,” DeBoer said today after the Devils returned from the All-Star break with a 90-minute practice.

“I think we’ve got 15 of 34 against our division. Five with the Rangers and four with the Islanders left. It’s going to play a big part here.”

The Devils, who lost to the Rangers, 4-1, on Dec. 20, face them twice in the next eight days, three times in 28 days and five times over the next seven weeks.

“Those are huge points,” captain Zach Parise said. “Those are 10 points we’d like to get. They’re going to be 10 important points for us to get into the playoffs.”

Martin Brodeur will start in a game that will force the Devils to quickly get out of their All-Star break mode.

“Obviously it gets you right into the mindset right off the bat,” DeBoer said. “This is a team that has been one of the elite teams in the league through the first two-thirds of the season. They’re in a group of teams that we want to get into. So we might as well get right at it.”

As for any player of the game prizes, the Devils used to do it.

“We had a Bobby Orr bronze statue with a Special Olympics gold medal wrapped around it,” Brodeur recalled. “We still have it somewhere around here, but we don’t use it like that anymore.

“It’s kind of hard to do something like that when other teams are doing it. You feel like you’re copying them. I think everybody knows who contributed in that game. Sometimes it will be mentioned in a meeting or whatever.

"From what I've seen on these shows like 24/7, we've never had anything like that where everybody stops and one guy gives it to the next guys. We never really did that. Even when we did it with the statue, it was the coaches handing it out. It's understandable that the Rangers or other teams are doing it, but it's a little too late for us. Even though we did it way back in the day."

Right winger David Clarkson said the Devils don't need a player of the game ritual.

"We don't have that here," Clarkson said. "I guess every team is different. I'm sure not every team does it. I don't think it's necessary. It's a team game. We're all on the same page. But I'm sure everyone has a different opinion on it."

Parise said: “I think it’s cool, but I don’t think it’s something every team needs to have. I guess whatever a coach likes to do. I'm not partial to one way or another. I don't know if I've ever played on a team that had something like that."

Preventing the Rangers from handing out their fedora would be good enough.